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News and Views from the Global SouthFri, 13 Sep 2019 21:17:01 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.8.10Calls for Reform, Research and Reorganisation in Leprosy Healthcarehttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/calls-reform-research-reorganisation-leprosy-healthcare/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=calls-reform-research-reorganisation-leprosy-healthcare
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/calls-reform-research-reorganisation-leprosy-healthcare/#respondThu, 12 Sep 2019 05:42:55 +0000Stella Paulhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163227Rachna Kumari of Munger in Eastern India’s Bihar state is not yet 30. But she’s already been married at 18, abandoned by her husband after she was diagnosed with leprosy and become an award-winning advocate of the disease. She has traversed a long road. And this week she undertook another step in her journey to […]

The 20th International Leprosy Congress (ILC) is being held Sept. 10 to 13 in Manila, Philippines. The conference is hosted every three years and was last held in China in 2016. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

By Stella PaulMANILA, Sep 12 2019 (IPS)

Rachna Kumari of Munger in Eastern India’s Bihar state is not yet 30. But she’s already been married at 18, abandoned by her husband after she was diagnosed with leprosy and become an award-winning advocate of the disease. She has traversed a long road. And this week she undertook another step in her journey to fly to Manila, Philippines, as a delegate at the 20th International Leprosy Congress (ILC).

The grassroots leader, who is employed by the International Leprosy Elimination Partnership (ILEP), has also previously traveled to Ethiopia and China to share stories about her life and her work.

Prior to attending the ILC yesterday Sept. 12, she participated in the Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease, an event co-organised by Japan’s The Nippon Foundation (TNF) and Sasakawa Health Foundation (SHF). The global forum gave her valuable insights into the universal challenges of leprosy-affected and leprosy advocates such as stigma and lack of financial sustainability, Kumari said.

She said she also gained technical education and management skills, which she feels are crucial for success in advocacy.

She added that when she carries out her work in communities across Munger, she has no official identification to show many of the Hansen’s disease-affected persons she comes across, many of whom are weary of strangers as they continue to face discrimination and stigma.

This simple form of accreditation, Kumari said, played a huge role in advocacy against the disease.

“[In] my community, I have nothing to prove that I am an advocate, a knowledge builder. So, people doubt me, they don’t know if they [can] trust me. A simple document of identification can be a big step to build trust between a community worker and her community,” Kumari told IPS.

Maya Ranavare, who works as a treasurer in Association of People Affected by Leprosy (APAL), in western India’s Maharashtra state, says that partnerships among organisations must not remain in closed rooms but should instead result in collective action that reaches communities.

“There is a sense of competition among people’s organisations. Instead, we must act collectively. Also, if it is a partnership, then there should not be duplicity. Tasks should be distributed evenly. If one organisation is doing mobilisation, other should work on technical education. This will increase everyone’s skill and ability,” Ranavare told IPS.

According to Dr Arturo Cunanan, the Chief Medical Officer of the Culion Sanitarium and General Hospital in the Philippines, there needs to be programmatic changes in the government public health system. Budgetary allocation, innovation, new research and sensitisation of healthcare workers are all needs of the hour.

“Leprosy elimination is now like a car that has run out of fuel. We need that fuel right now. The fuel is innovation. Take vaccination for example. Why is that even after centuries, we still don’t have a vaccination for universal application?

“Also, we need innovative, easier ways to diagnose leprosy. If you look at Tuberculosis, there are several ways to do a quick test and find out if a person has it. But for leprosy, we still have only clinical test. We need new tools, quicker ways and for all of that we need new investments in innovation, research,“ Cunanan told IPS.

The ILC started runs Sep 10 to 13. The congress will identify the priorities for a future course of action to end leprosy. Currently there are 200,000 new leprosy cases reported every year across the world, with 60 percent of those new cases originating in India.

According to the organisers, the congress will identify the priorities for the future course of action for achieving zero leprosy. The congress also emphasised the importance of partnerships and a new future partnership among the leprosy-affected people’s organisations has already started between HANDA – a Chinese NGO– and PERMATA, an NGO based in Indonesia.

HANDA, which has recently been recognised by the government of China for their skills in project management, finance management and organisational re-structuring, is set to share these crucial skills with PERMATA.

“We will soon host a delegation from PERMATA in our Guanzhou office. They have a special interest in finance management and we are ready to share our expertise and experience in that area with them,” Sally Qi of HANDA told IPS.

SHF was instrumental in building this partnership and encouraged both HANDA and PERMATA to start a dialogue on skill sharing, Qi added.

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]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/calls-reform-research-reorganisation-leprosy-healthcare/feed/0The Push for Peace-From the Global Village to the Global Neighborhoodhttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/push-peace-global-village-global-neighborhood/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=push-peace-global-village-global-neighborhood
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/push-peace-global-village-global-neighborhood/#respondWed, 11 Sep 2019 17:54:13 +0000Siddharth Chatterjeehttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163232From the ashes of a tragedy that wiped out almost 90% of the city of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, an institute called the Hiroshima Peacebuilders Center (HPC) rose like a phoenix of hope that is pioneering the creation of a global pool of peacebuilders. It is driven by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development […]

From the ashes of a tragedy that wiped out almost 90% of the city of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, an institute called the Hiroshima Peacebuilders Center (HPC) rose like a phoenix of hope that is pioneering the creation of a global pool of peacebuilders. It is driven by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development declaration that “there can be no sustainable development without peace and no peace without sustainable development.”

Hiroshima underwent miraculous post-war reconstruction after World War II, and it epitomizes speed, innovation, technology and efficiency which marks the Japanese character of utter discipline and loyalty to the vision. An architectural and engineering feat of reconstruction.

Today HPC supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, trains professional peacebuilders to assist war – torn societies and they are doing a remarkable job. I have seen this first hand and I have had the privilege of facilitating two mid-career courses which brings together Japanese and non-Japanese United Nations professionals who work in different conflict affected parts of the world.

The UN Secretary General Mr Antonio Guterres once made a profound remark- “the world is in pieces and we need world peace”. With over 65 million people displaced, due to conflict, instability, climate shocks and sheer degrading poverty, the message from the UN Secretary General is a clarion call to action. Japan has stepped up. In fact, Japan’s pacifist constitution may hold the key to a world free of conflict, violence and instability.

At the HPC, various programmes are being implemented to develop practical knowledge, skills and experience in peacebuilding and development among civilians, an important contribution towards transforming conflict-prone countries into peaceful nations engaged in the pursuit of SDG 16.

Having seen both worlds – as a former combat veteran and later as an international civil servant, where I have been working to bring dignity to people ravaged by war in various countries – I know the importance of such institutions. For instance, the many years of my UN career spent in Somalia, South Sudan Iraq, Darfur, between 1997 to date, will always remain a poignant reminder of the disparate harm that women and children are predisposed to whenever one form or other of humanitarian crisis arises.

With recent technological advances on one hand giving a leg-up, and on the other rolling back progress on the United Nations Charter’s vision of getting the peoples of the world ‘to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours‘, institutions such as HPC are increasingly needed.

The strings of guilt have continued to pull at the collective global heart after the events of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In subsequent years, the world has drafted the United Nations Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as well as numerous treaties and conventions, all seeking to ensure global peace.

By telescoping distance and time, scientific advances have given us the ‘global village’, yet the more people have of things that bring them together, the more they have tended to invent others that divide them.

One such development is the indisputable evidence that all of humanity is vulnerable in current rates of ecological degradation. However, while the web of interdependence continues to thicken, debates about what needs to be done and by whom rages, delaying consensus on remedial action.

The reasons we need citizens to drive global neighbourhood are legion: maintaining peace and order, expanding economic activity, combating pandemic diseases, deterring terrorists and sharing scarce resources are just a few of them.

We cannot have any illusions about the scope of the challenge ahead. As we move towards working with others, clashes between the familiar and the different are expected. Stresses will result from people having to come to terms with new circumstances.

A transformation of the mindset will be a key driver of the triple nexus of peace, security and development as the world seeks to draft a post-conflict agenda. To achieve this, a critical mass of leaders who can push countries to adapt universal norms of good neighborhoods is needed, which is what institutions like HPC are helping to build.

While human survival and resilience against new diseases must depend on scientific discoveries, there must be a part of humanity that checks the temptation to turn those same discoveries into ever more efficient killing machines.

More international institutions that work to create a generation of citizens as the dynamos of the vehicle of peacebuilding need to be established. That one of the leaders towards that vision is a region that carries the scars of the worst devastation caused by war provides inspiration that a moral revolution is possible, even as the scientific revolution continues.

Japan’s former Prime Minster and Nobel laureate Mr. Eisaku Sato once said, “Japan is the only country in the world to have suffered the ravages of atomic bombing. That experience left an indelible mark on the hearts of our people, making them passionately determined to renounce all wars”.

Siddharth Chatterjee is the United Nations Resident Coordinator to Kenya.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/push-peace-global-village-global-neighborhood/feed/0‘Conference Emphasises Need for Partnerships to Create a World Without Leprosy’http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/conference-emphasises-need-partnerships-create-world-without-leprosy/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=conference-emphasises-need-partnerships-create-world-without-leprosy
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/conference-emphasises-need-partnerships-create-world-without-leprosy/#respondWed, 11 Sep 2019 17:06:08 +0000Stella Paulhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163224Forty years ago, Yohei Sasakawa saw his father moved to tears after meeting and witnessing the suffering of people affected by leprosy – also known as Hansen’s disease. Not only did the patients have a physical illness, but they also suffered from social exclusion and discrimination. It made the young Sasakawa vow to work for […]

Forty years ago, Yohei Sasakawa saw his father moved to tears after meeting and witnessing the suffering of people affected by leprosy – also known as Hansen’s disease. Not only did the patients have a physical illness, but they also suffered from social exclusion and discrimination. It made the young Sasakawa vow to work for the elimination of leprosy from the world – just as his father had been doing.

Decades later, after visiting 120 countries and having meetings with countless policy makers and state leaders, Sasakawa – now the World Health Organisation (WHO) Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination – is delivering on his promise.

At the first day of the 20th International Leprosy Congress (ILC), being held in Manila, Philippines, the chairperson ofThe Nippon Foundation (TNF) called for activists, scholars and those affected the globe over, to rally behind the goal of a world free of stigma, discrimination and violation of human rights of those affected by leprosy. The ILC, which ends Sep 13, is supported by TNF sister organisation the Sasakawa Health Foundation (SHF).

Sharing his experiences, he recalled how he, TNF and SHF lobbied the United Nations to recognise the elimination of stigma against leprosy-affected people as a human rights issue.

Sasakawa reminded delegates that it was a tough journey against several odds as policy makers and diplomats showed little interest in the human rights of leprosy-affected people. He told the congress how during a 2003 U.N. Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva, only five members attended the event to discuss stigma as a human rights violation in a room that could accommodate 50.

Not one to give up, Sasakawa kept pursuing the issue until finally in December 2010 the U.N. General Assembly unanimously adopted the resolution on elimination of discrimination against persons affected by leprosy and their family members and accompanying principle and guidelines was passed.

“I believe the elimination has been an important milestone in my journey,” Sasakawa said.

But despite the U.N. resolution and various local laws at country level worldwide abolishing policies like segregation and isolation of the leprosy-affected, society still stigmatises and discriminates against Hansen’s disease patients as well those who work within the field, like health care workers etc.

He said one example of this remains is the classification of leprosy as a neglected tropical disease.

“I would like to express my opposition to leprosy being considered as one of the neglected tropical diseases. Leprosy has never been neglected even for a moment by both persons affected and by people who have worked hard for their betterment. In my opinion, this medical terminology feels like it is looking down on the patients and also shows a lack of respect towards those are fighting against leprosy today. Leprosy is an ongoing issue.”

However, Sasakawa also acknowledged that in other areas — such as the partnerships and networking — there has been great progress. The Global Partnership for Zero Leprosy network was a significant step forward.

“The collaboration will greatly enhance our work towards achieving ‘Zero Leprosy,'” he said, adding that the strengthening of these partnerships, especially with the governments, was crucial to reach the common goal of a leprosy-free world.

“Whenever I go abroad, I always meet with the national leaders of the countries. We cannot solve the issue of leprosy without their understanding and support. Without their support, we cannot secure the budget for activities to eliminate leprosy and the associated discrimination,” he reminded the congress.

Rachna Kumari, of International Federation of Anti-leprosy Associations or ILEP, who is based in Munger in Eastern India’s Bihar state, told IPS: “We cannot end stigma just by treating leprosy as a health issue.”

If only health workers are assigned to work on leprosy, they will work on medication. That is not enough to solve the problem we face. So, we need education. Government must include information on leprosy in school books. There must be billboards and large posters which can educate both patients and healthcare workers. Only with such a holistic approach we can win this,” Kumari said.

Earlier, delivering the keynote speech, the Philippine Secretary of Health Francisco Duque asserted that his government remains serious about respecting the rights of leprosy-affected people.

“The vision of our Universal healthcare for the Filipino people is deeply tied to the aspirations of the 2016-2020 global strategy for the leprosy and goal number 3 of the SDGs or the sustainable development goals. We remain committed to these goals and aspirations. We are committed to zero stigma, zero disability, zero transmission and zero disease,” Duque told the congress.

Duque also stressed the importance of partnerships to achieve the goals yet unmet.

“We are only a few months away form 2020 and our midterm strategy is only getting underway. We must work together. This year’s conference emphasises the need for partnerships to create a world without leprosy. And our success and your success may define the relations we have made and continue to make.

Acknowledging stigma as a “barrier for early detection and treatment“ of leprosy, Huong Thi Giang Tran, WHO’s Director for Disease Control in the Western Pacific also said that stigma limits the opportunity for life and leads to social and economic exclusion. She called for the addressing of stigma at the policy level.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/conference-emphasises-need-partnerships-create-world-without-leprosy/feed/0Nothing For Us, Without Us – Hansen’s Disease-Affected Tell International Gatheringhttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/nothing-us-without-us-hansens-disease-affected-tell-international-gathering/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=nothing-us-without-us-hansens-disease-affected-tell-international-gathering
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/nothing-us-without-us-hansens-disease-affected-tell-international-gathering/#respondWed, 11 Sep 2019 12:26:57 +0000Ben Kritzhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163218Stronger government action to fight stigma and discrimination, more government funding for health and non-health support programmes, and a larger role for people’s organisations in developing policy towards Hansen’s disease treatment and eradication are still needed for eliminating the disease. This was some of the recommendations made by participants of the first ever Global Forum of […]

Jennifer Quimno of the Coalition of Leprosy Advocates of the Philippines (CLAP) (centre) is joined by Sri Lanka's Shagana Thiygalingam (L) and Amarasinghe Manjula (R) after Quimno delivered the recommendations presented by the Global Forum of People's Organisations on Hansen's Disease to the International Leprosy Congress in Manila on September 11. Credit: Ben Kritz/IPS

By Ben KritzMANILA, Sep 11 2019 (IPS)

Stronger government action to fight stigma and discrimination, more government funding for health and non-health support programmes, and a larger role for people’s organisations in developing policy towards Hansen’s disease treatment and eradication are still needed for eliminating the disease.

This was some of the recommendations made by participants of the first ever Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease today, Sept. 11 during a presentation to global academics, scientists, researchers, health staff, partners and those affected by the disease at the 20th International Leprosy Congress (ILC).

Jennifer Quimno, secretary of the Coalition of Leprosy Advocates of the Philippines (CLAP), was chosen by the forum participants to represent the group.

The ILC, which is currently being held in Manila, Philippines, is hosted every three years and was last held in China in 2016.

Prior to the start of the congress, Japan’s Sasakawa Health Foundation (SHF) and The Nippon Foundation (TNF), which support elimination of the disease as well as various organisations of persons affected by the disease, held a global gathering from Sept. 7 to 10. For the first time, organisations of those affected by Hansen’s disease from 23 countries across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean met to share their know-how and experiences in eliminating Hansen’s disease.

Along with recommendations for eliminating discriminatory laws and practices, including social, psychological, and economic support in Hansen’s disease management programmes, and giving people affected by the disease a greater voice in policy formulation, the forum debated that a shift in terminology from “leprosy” to “Hansen’s disease” be promoted to help combat the historic stigma associated with the disease. No consensus was reached, however.

The recommendations called for comprehensive action and the involvement of non-health agencies and other stakeholders, because areas such as clean water and sanitation, proper housing, education, and dignified work are all, in the view of people’s organisations, critical to efforts to stamp out the disease.

The forum also called for a much greater role for people’s organisations in sustaining Hansen’s Disease treatment, rehabilitation, and services, and in promoting dignity, equality, and respect for human rights.

“Hansen’s disease is more than a disease caused by a bacterium. Poverty, institutional, social and political neglect, complacency and the structural invisibility of vulnerable populations contribute to the perpetuation of Hansen’s disease,” the final draft of the forum’s recommendations read.

Other key recommendations presented to the ILC by the forum include: More funding for research to fill scientific knowledge gaps that still exist (much remains unclear about the transmission of the disease); greater focus by national programmes on case detection, disability prevention, and rehabilitation during treatment; and more funding for “care after cure” programmes, including psychological, social, and economic rehabilitation.

To combat the stigma associated with the disease, the forum urged the widest possible dissemination and adoption by governments, NGOs, and other stakeholders of United Nations guidelines for the elimination of stigma and discrimination.

The conclusions also made a firm demand for the elimination of all existing discriminatory laws and practises globally, saying that this would further require “affirmative and reparation policies,” in order to be truly effective in promoting equality.

The people’s organisations also made a call for a greater role in government policy-making toward leprosy. They did not neglect improvements in their own capabilities as well. While calling on governments to develop measurable action plans, the people’s organisations noted they must improve their effectiveness by through strengthening networks, and engaging more productively with governments.

Hope for the future, but a few uncertainties

Participants at the global forum who attended the first day of the ILC expressed hope the recommendations would lead to positive action, but noted uncertainties remain.

“Being able to do this at the ILC is a milestone for us, to have our perspective heard,” Frank Onde, president of CLAP, told IPS. While people affected by Hansen’s disease have regularly participated in the ILC, Onde felt this was the first time recommendations were presented in an organised way.

For Indonesia’s Ermawati, a member of PerMaTa, “Attending this congress is like a dream, to come from my village to be involved in a gathering like this,” she told IPS. “It’s inspiring, and I hope it would inspire others [affected by leprosy] to join us and help others.”

Ermawati was hopeful the recommendations would lead to greater awareness and reduce stigma, particularly the discrimination against women in her country. “I hope it leads to greater acceptance, particularly of us women. In my country, the stigma is very great.” One problem faced by Indonesian women afflicted with leprosy is that they cannot marry; if laws in an area do not actually prohibit it, the culture in most places encourages men to shun these women.

Shagana Thiyagalingam, who is from Sri Lanka, felt that Quimno’s presentation was inspiring. Quimno spoke of how after both she and her father had contracted the disease, but how she still continued her studies currently works with the government health department. “Her story was so motivational,” Shagana told IPS. “It should encourage other women to come forward and feel less stigma.”

While optimistic about what lies ahead, CLAP’s Onde, and his Indonesian counterpart Paulus Manek, the president of PerMaTa, expressed a few reservations. “The barriers [between people’s organisations and government agencies] really need to be minimised,” Onde said.

Manek saw the size of the ILC gathering itself as a sort of barrier to effective action. “It’s almost too big,” Manek said. “I see people here, they are interested in one or two issues only. Maybe there should be a closer focus on fewer issues at once.”

He also suggested that new guidelines from the United Nations Human Rights Council would be useful.

“It would help us,” Manek said. “I think the media can also help to spread awareness and stopping discrimination.”

Quimno for her part was hoping to see some concrete actions taken as a result of her presentation on behalf of the global forum. “There are so many gaps to fill, so I would hope these people here would commit to studying and planning actions to take on the things we recommended. That would be progress.”

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/nothing-us-without-us-hansens-disease-affected-tell-international-gathering/feed/0The Emergence of a Global Voice for Hansen’s Disease Affected Personshttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/emergence-global-voice-hansens-disease-affected-persons/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=emergence-global-voice-hansens-disease-affected-persons
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/emergence-global-voice-hansens-disease-affected-persons/#respondTue, 10 Sep 2019 14:17:30 +0000Ben Kritzhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163200The Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease, which was attended by members of people’s organisations from 23 different countries, wrapped up in Manila, Philippines, today Sept. 10 after four days of discussion and deliberation. The main outcome was a set of recommendations, which included participants stating that those affected by the disease should […]

Her experience and the chance "to help strengthen Colombia, the world, and my family" through participating in the Global Forum of People's Organisations on Hansen's Disease, sponsored by the Nippon Foundation and the Sasakawa Health Foundation, was like "rising from the ashes" for Lucrecia Vazques from Felehansen Colombia. Vazques' family was hit hard by leprosy, with not only herself, but her son and one-month-old granddaughter being afflicted. Credit: Ben Kritz/IPS

By Ben KritzMANILA, Sep 10 2019 (IPS)

The Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease, which was attended by members of people’s organisations from 23 different countries, wrapped up in Manila, Philippines, today Sept. 10 after four days of discussion and deliberation.

The main outcome was a set of recommendations, which included participants stating that those affected by the disease should have more inclusive roles in the global campaign against leprosy.

Asked to share his impressions of the forum with his fellow participants, Joshua Oraga, who is a member of ALM Kenya, a local Hansen’s disease non-profit, told the audience, “We should all familiarise ourselves with the WHO [World Health Organisation] guidelines on strengthening the participation of persons affected by leprosy in leprosy services. That should be our creed, because if you look at that document, you will see that we are the only stakeholders who have an end-to-end role.”

He said that those affected by leprosy or Hansen’s disease had a role in overcoming stigma and discrimination.

“We have a role in the promotion of equity, social justice, and human rights, we have a role in addressing gender issues, we have a role in the dissemination of information, education, communication…. We have a role in advocacy, we have a role in counselling and psychological support, we have a role in training and capacity-building, we have a role in referral services, we have a role in resource mobilisation…. So, we are everywhere!”

The recommendations will be presented on the first day of the International Leprosy Congress (ILC), which is also being held in Manila from Sept. 11 to 13. The recommendations addressed increasing awareness of Hansen’s Disease among the public and governments, calling for greater government support for people’s organisations’ advocacies, taking a larger role in helping to form anti-leprosy policy, and working to build sustainability and more effective networks among organisations spread around the world.

A true people’s forum

To Dr. Takahiro Nanri, Executive Director of SHF, the real value of the recommendations lies not in their details, but in the manner in which they developed.

Nanri noted that the forum’s carefully-planned agenda was quickly thrown off-schedule by the spirited discussions among the participants. “The people really led the forum, and did the work they wanted to do, and I am very happy about that.”

“The recommendations were good ones, but what I think is really important is the process we saw,” he added.

Oraga was likewise pleased and motivated by his experience. Oraga, who had leprosy as a youth, said, “This is the first time I have had the opportunity to take part in a meeting at this level, so imagine my excitement and happiness to be able to come here.”

Oraga also expressed his gratitude for the work that Yohei Sasakawa, World Health Organization’s (WHO) Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination and chairperson of TNF, has done over the last four decades. Sasakawa’s foundations have contributed over USD200 million in financial support for the WHO’s Global Leprosy programme. He also advocated for discrimination and stigmatisation against people affected by Hansen’s disease to be included in the United Nations human rights agenda. The resolution was passed in 2010.

“He has done so much for leprosy around the world, and personally I am grateful. Just think of it, because of Mr. Sasakawa, in three years, maybe leprosy will just be like any ordinary sickness,” Oraga said.

Lucrecia Vazques of Felehansen, Colombia also felt the forum was an extraordinary experience. “It’s been wonderful,” she told IPS through a Spanish translator. “It is like resuscitating after a hard moment.”

Vazques’s bubbly personality belies her own difficult experience with Hansen’s disease, which not only afflicted her, but her one-month-old granddaughter and her son, who was diagnosed first.

“It was hard,” Lucrecia said. “I had no knowledge whatsoever.We thought we would die.”

“But there was something to fight for, and to live for, and here I am. This forum means rising from the ashes. And if I had the choice, I would rise from the ashes again, and I would be right here, to help strengthen Colombia, and the world, and my family,” she said.

Looking ahead

But there is much work to still do.

“Because this was a people-led forum, it gives us direction. As you know, our resources are not limitless. We have an obligation, but it is of course better if we can maximise our efforts, and the recommendations help,” Nanri said.

Nanri reiterated the value of the “process” that he saw evolve during the forum, particularly in the context of the Joint Campaign on World Leprosy Day 2020, which will be observed on Jan. 26 next year.

“This was a step. You don’t go from the ground to the 10th floor in one jump. So now the first step has been taken. The next step is to get the groups around the world to do the activities at the same time,” which is the goal of the joint campaign. “When these recommendations are presented at the ILC, the next step can begin,” he said.

Octogenarian Yohei Sasakawa has travelled to more than 90 countries across the globe; from areas of conflict, to the jungles of Brazil, shaking hands, hugging and washing the feet of Hansen’s disease-affected people. His message is simple: Stop stigmatisation and eliminate the disease.

Sasakawa, who has spent more than 40 years working towards elimination of Hansen’s disease, is the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination and chairperson of The Nippon Foundation (TNF). Since 1975, TNF and its sister organisation, the Sasakawa Health Foundation (SHF), have contributed over USD200 million in financial support for the WHO’s Global Leprosy programme. Both foundations support elimination of the disease globally and provide information and awareness about the disease through the Leprosy Today website.

Sasakawa told IPS in an exclusive interview that he does not believe in sitting in “air-conditioned rooms” looking at data and making decisions about the elimination of the disease. “That will not be helpful to people. You must go to the actual site. That is why I travel across the world — even if it’s scorching deserts or the jungles of Brazil or areas that are difficult to reach or even areas that are dangerous.”

Sasakawa, who says that discrimination and stigmatisation against people affected by Hansen’s disease was the original human rights violation, advocated for this to be included in the United Nations human rights agenda.

Yohei Sasakawa, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination and chairperson of The Nippon Foundation, has dedicated more than four decades towards eliminating Hansen’s disease and putting an end to the stigmatisation that people affected by the disease face globally. Courtesy: Sasakawa Health Foundation/The Nippon Foundation

In 2010, his efforts bore fruition when the United Nations General Assembly Resolution on elimination of discrimination against persons affected by leprosy and their family members and accompanying principle and guidelines was passed.

“If you look around us, there are multiple issues in front of us. When it comes to leprosy, people discriminating against people started in the age of the Old Testament. So it goes back a long time in our past history. So I think leprosy is the origin of human rights violation because of the fact that it started such a long time ago,” the recipient of the 2019 Order of the Rising Sun and 2018 Gandhi Peace Prize winner told IPS.

He said that 60 percent of the more than 210,000 new global leprosy cases for 2017 originated in India, adding that India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi had made a strong commitment to make 2030 the year of zero leprosy in the country.

Sasakawa is currently in Manila, Philippines, to attend the TNF/SHF-sponsored Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease, which is being held Sept. 7 to 10. He will also deliver a keynote address at the 20th International Leprosy Congress (ILC), which takes place Sept. 11 to 13.

Through his work Sasakawa has met more than 150 national leaders, including presidents and prime ministers, sharing his message and gaining their support and commitment to eliminate leprosy.

However, he stressed, that his efforts alone would not eliminate the disease and called on the youth to “take action in their own countries” and encouraged them to begin discussions for solutions on social media platforms.

YOHEI SASAKAWA, World Health Organization’s (WHO) Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination and chairperson of The Nippon Foundation, speaks to IPS correspondent Stella Paul about his decades long campaign to achieve zero leprosy and eliminate stigmatisation of those affected.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/join-journey-eliminate-leprosy-ambassador/feed/0The Costs of Heightened Conflict in the Himalayashttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/costs-heightened-conflict-himalayas/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=costs-heightened-conflict-himalayas
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/costs-heightened-conflict-himalayas/#respondTue, 10 Sep 2019 03:54:20 +0000Omair Ahmadhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163188Omair Ahmad is the South Asia Managing Editor for The Third Pole.

As a series of conflicts in the Hindu Kush Himalayan region come into sharp focus, sidelining local populations, the long-term environmental costs may leave the region degraded, poor and desperate. Courtesy: CC by 2.0/Lensmatter

By Omair AhmadSep 10 2019 (IPS)

As a series of conflicts in the Hindu Kush Himalayan region come into sharp focus, sidelining local populations, the long-term environmental costs may leave the region degraded, poor and desperate.

It has been a month since India cut off communications and implemented a security lockdown in the part of Kashmir it governs. While India has explained that the governance changes it is implementing – rendering significant legislative changes in territory it governs – as an internal matter, the move has drawn strong reactions from Pakistan and China, both of which claim the territory, at least in some part. The political outcome of these changes are a matter for both international relations and domestic politics within the various countries, but this move is one of many political factors that will make cooperation over the environment in the Hindu Kush Himalayas (HKH) far more difficult.

The Indus, a river of troubles

The impact of any political troubles will be felt the most along the Indus, which rises in Tibetan territory controlled by China, winds through the part of Kashmir under Indian control, enters Pakistan, with one stretch entering and exiting Afghanistan, before reaching the sea after traversing Pakistani territory. The two countries where most of the Indus basin is located are India and Pakistan, and their management of the river is largely governed by the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) signed in 1960. The Treaty has survived the outbreak of the 1965 war and the 1971 war between the two countries, as well as a host of skirmishes and conflict, and it is unlikely to be negatively affected now, as it was not affected in the last such crisis in 2017.

The problem, though, is less about the treaty as it has functioned in the past, but how it will function in the future. The IWT was a product of its times, and thus issues like environmental impact were not covered. The recent Hindu Kush Himalayan Monitoring and Assessment Programme (HIMAP) project led by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development highlighted that climate change impacts – everything from irregular rainfall to glacier retreat – in the HKH region would be felt most within the Indus basin. These are new factors that the treaty is not designed to cover. The hope that these could be brought into the treaty has now receded. With the Pakistani government withdrawing its High Commissioner from India, and lowering its diplomatic engagement, it seems unlikely that these issues will get the attention they deserve.

More importantly the Kabul river, part of the Indus, is not covered by any treaty. Pakistani policymakers have been hoping for an IWT-type treaty between Pakistan and Afghanistan would deal with many outstanding issues. But with lowered cooperation between India and Pakistan, the IWT looks less and less like a good example to follow. The idea of including China as well, so that the four countries could all be involved in the joint management of a river basin that they all share now seems almost impossible to imagine.

In the meanwhile conflict will continue to degrade the environment, while also limiting scientific access to the more remote parts of the HKH region. Both Indian and Pakistani troops continue to be deployed on the Siachen glacier, the highest battlefield in the world, costing both countries significant amounts of expenditure and significant loss of lives due to the harsh climatic conditions. The material and garbage accumulated on a glacier has significant negative effects for the environment, not to mention cutting off areas like this from any kind of scientific assessment. Reports like HIMAP, dependent on the cooperation of the various governments, will have to continue to deal with these blind spots.

The dangers of over-centralisation

By its very nature, conflict centralises decisionmaking, as security issues take precedence over everything else. This can have disastrous results on the local environment. This was most clearly demonstrated by the Rohingya crisis in Mayanmar and Bangladesh. The million refugees created due to the crisis led to the environmental destitution of the areas where the refugees were settled in camps.

By laying mines across the areas the routes that the Rohingya took, the Myanmarese military may have meant only to restrict human movement, but these were also traditional elephant corridors. Insurgency and civil war in India’s northeast and Nepal, had a deleterious impact on the rhino population, as poachers found it easy to operate. All 30 rhinos translocated to the Bardiya National Park where killed during the Nepalese civil conflict. In Kashmir, the decades of conflict have led to extensive poaching, the destruction of delicate habitats, and a timber mafia operating with impunity. With militarised borders, populations of key species, such as the yak, will find it difficult to travel freely, leading to limited cross breeding, and the decline of their populations.

The centralising tendencies of governments when it comes to “internal security” issues can possibly be best seen in the Tibetan region, where Beijing insisted on implementing agricultural and animal husbandry practices out of sync with local cultures. The local practices had evolved in consonance with the environment of the region, and had been more sustainable, something that China is now discovering, decades after putting into place self-harming practices. Nevertheless this sidelining of local populations remains a significant part of China’s investments abroad, with the China Pakistan Economic Corridor offering a very clear example. Due to its high political value for Pakistan, the investments are handled at high government levels with military support. Local factors are rarely factored in, so the heavy investment at the Gwadar port being built at the end of CPEC has managed to isolate and marginalise local fisherfolk.

Making the mountains poorer

Lastly, there are significant financial costs of the conflict on local people. Fear of violence undermines the confidence of outsiders willing to invest in a region, leaving people dependent on either government funds or their own limited means. The HKH region is one of the most biodiversity rich regions on the planet, and yet its mountain population are significantly poorer than their fellow citizens in their own countries. Despite potential opportunities for innovation and investment, the remoteness of the communities means that other than heavy infrastructure such as dams – which tend to marginalise local communities even more – investment does not reach these areas.

Fear of conflict will only make this more difficult, depriving the 240 million people that live in the mountainous areas of the HKH region that much poorer. This is at a time when climate change is already negatively impacting traditional crops such as apples, and half of the springs in the HKH region have either dried up, or become seasonal from perennial. Desperate people, who have few options, and whose involvement in governance is limited, make for poor caretakers of the environment.

While discussion of conflict between the countries of the Himalayan region is often spoken of in the same breath as nuclear war, the clear and present danger of a breakdown of cooperation in the region may be simpler. The price of conflict may simply mean that the environment is degraded, species are lost, scientific enquiry is stifled, investment is hobbled, and the hundreds of millions of people dependent on the delicate ecosystem of the HKH region will be made poorer and more miserable. It may not be a global catastrophe, but it will certainly be a series of local catastrophes.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/costs-heightened-conflict-himalayas/feed/0Awareness Should be the Priority in Public Health Efforts against Leprosyhttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/awareness-priority-public-health-efforts-leprosy/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=awareness-priority-public-health-efforts-leprosy
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/awareness-priority-public-health-efforts-leprosy/#respondMon, 09 Sep 2019 12:44:28 +0000Ben Kritzhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163176Increasing awareness of the continuing existence of Hansen’s Disease (leprosy) is critical to sustaining effective public health efforts against the disease, eliminating the social stigma associated with it, and halting its transmission. That was the consensus reached by participants at the Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease in Manila on Sept. 9, following […]

]]>The post Awareness Should be the Priority in Public Health Efforts against Leprosy appeared first on Inter Press Service.
]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/awareness-priority-public-health-efforts-leprosy/feed/0Kashmir: How Modi’s Aggressive ‘Hindutva’ Project has Brought India and Pakistan to the Brink – Againhttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/kashmir-modis-aggressive-hindutva-project-brought-india-pakistan-brink/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=kashmir-modis-aggressive-hindutva-project-brought-india-pakistan-brink
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/kashmir-modis-aggressive-hindutva-project-brought-india-pakistan-brink/#respondMon, 09 Sep 2019 02:55:36 +0000Abdullah Yusufhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163160Abdullah Yusuf is a lecturer in politics at the University of Dundee.

The Indian government put an end to large scale protests by revoking the autonomy of Indian-administered Kashmir – a status provided for under the Indian Constitution. Thousands of troops were deployed and the valley region faced unprecedented lockdown. Credit: Umer Asif/IPS

By Abdullah YusufSep 9 2019 (IPS)

August is immensely important in the history of the Asian subcontinent, marking the month that India and Pakistan gained independence from the British in 1947. Now, in 2019, it has once again proved momentous, when, ten days before India’s Independence day celebrations, prime minister Narendra Modi’s government revoked the autonomy of Indian-administered Kashmir – a status provided for under the Indian Constitution.

This latest move was a manifesto pledge from Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which claims that Kashmir’s autonomy has hindered its development while fostering an area of thriving terrorism and smuggling.

Soon, thousands of troops were deployed and the valley region faced unprecedented lockdown. Experts say that Modi’s move to tether the Muslim majority of Kashmir is a gamble that could trigger conflict with Pakistan while reigniting an insurgency that has already cost tens of thousands of lives.

Kashmir: a brief history

Until 1947, Kashmir was a territorially well-defined and functional state that had existed for a century before its seizure by the British in 1846. The British decolonisation of the subcontinent in 1947 was instrumental in creating disorder that pushed Kashmir into a repeated cycle of war and stalemate between Pakistan and India, which have both claimed the region as sovereign territory for the last 70 years.

Today, Kashmir’s geopolitical position and glacial water reserves – which provide fresh water and hydro-electric power to millions – add an extra dimension to the existing sectarian and ideological conflict between India and Pakistan over this small northern region.

The Kashmir issue has resulted in three wars between these two countries – in 1947, 1965 and 1999 – triggering numerous UN Security Council Resolutions – which unequivocally call for the Kashmiris’ right to self-determination.

Modi’s Hindu nationalist project

Many within the region feel that Modi’s BJP is brazenly trying to change Kashmir’s ethnic composition to disadvantage India’s Muslim minority by encouraging more Hindus into the region. Since the revocation of Article 370 (which assured the region’s autonomy), Indian Kashmiri leaders who vehemently opposed the decision – including two former chief ministers – have been sent to jail.

Modi’s government has a history of stoking tensions between Hindus and Muslims, with its political rule now focused on “Hindutva”, which translates roughly as “Hindu-ness”, and reframes Hinduism as an identity rather than a theology or religion.

Modi has fostered Hindu nationalism through anti-Islamic rhetoric, accusing Muslim men of attempting to change India’s demographics by seducing Hindu women, as well as encouraging lynching of Muslims falsely accused of eating beef (from the sacred Hindu cow) in BJP controlled states. Clearly, these are tactics designed to expand the notion of Hindutva and further isolate the Muslim population within India. Targeting Kashmir is a crucial part of the strategy.

Dangerous tensions and nuclear options

In the wake of India’s decision to revoke Kashmir’s special status, there are two key questions.

Second, how is the situation affecting the already tense relations between India and Pakistan? India’s land grab comes just five months after a breakdown in relations following claims by India that a Pakistani-based suicide bomber killed 44 Indian soldiers in the Kashmir region, leading to airstrikes by both sides. The situation threatens to reignite this conflict with both countries cautioning the world about the nuclear option.

Addressing a joint session of Pakistan’s parliament on August 6, prime minister Imran Khan briefed lawmakers on the steps his government had taken towards peace in the region. But he maintained the situation in Indian-occupied Kashmir would deteriorate and its neighbour would blame and attack Pakistan.

Days later, Indian defence minister Rajnath Singh stated that India is committed to “no first use” of nuclear weapons, but future policy is dependent on the ever-evolving circumstances. These sentiments have led to international debate over the possibility of nuclear weapons being unleashed.

Parallels with East Timor

With this nuclear threat ever present, the situation in Kashmir is now one of the most dangerous in the world. Since the two countries have consistently failed to make any progress, external help from the international community and the UN is crucial in resolving the conflict and preventing further escalation.

As the world witnessed in the case of East Timor in 1999, independence from Indonesia after two decades of bloodshed was achieved following a referendum held under the stewardship of the UN. This result was not accepted by Indonesia, which launched a scorched-earth campaign, killing more than 1,500 Timorese, displacing nearly half the population, and razing much of East Timor to the ground.

The subsequent progression towards independence and peacebuilding was facilitated by external bodies such as the UN-mandated International Force in East Timor and the Transitional Administration in East Timor, underscoring the importance of support from both the UN and the international community.

The UN didn’t achieve success overnight, but endured through increasing international pressure, combined with a change in the Suharto government. Soon, Indonesia found itself falling out of favour with the international community.

There are parallels here for the Kashmir situation. Although progress may be slow while Modi’s populist BJP remains in power, pressure from the international community would likely go a long way towards pulling both countries back from the brink. In the meantime, while Modi tries to remake India in the BJP’s Hindutva image, for Kashmiris the struggle for self-determination goes on.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/kashmir-modis-aggressive-hindutva-project-brought-india-pakistan-brink/feed/0The Business of Social Enterprisehttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/business-social-enterprise/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=business-social-enterprise
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/business-social-enterprise/#respondSun, 08 Sep 2019 12:25:22 +0000Ben Kritzhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163150Organisations supporting people affected by Hansen’s disease (leprosy) have social rather than capitalist aims, but they need to take a business-minded approach to their work if they wish to be sustainable, experts at a global conference in Manila, Philippines said. In workshops conducted at the Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease in Manila […]

Ariel Lazarte of the Coalition of Leprosy Advocates of the Philippines (CLAP) shows off the dried fish production run by patients of a transient house operated by HD (Hope & Dignity) Philippines. Courtesy: Ariel Lazarte

By Ben KritzMANILA, Sep 8 2019 (IPS)

Organisations supporting people affected by Hansen’s disease (leprosy) have social rather than capitalist aims, but they need to take a business-minded approach to their work if they wish to be sustainable, experts at a global conference in Manila, Philippines said.

In workshops conducted at the Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease in Manila on Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 7 and 8, representatives of organisations from Asia, Africa, and Latin America agreed that sustainability is the biggest challenge they face.

Every organisation faces some uncertainty over the continuity of donor or government financial support, so reducing or eliminating reliance on external funding is considered a critical priority.

At a regional conference of people’s organisations held here in March, SHF Executive Director Dr. Takahiro Nanri stressed that his foundation’s goal was to see its beneficiaries become self-supporting. “In order to be truly sustainable, the organisation needs to develop an income-generating programme,” Nanri said at the time.

Dr. Marie Lisa Dacanay president of the Institute for Social Entrepreneurship in Asia (ISEA) outlined the fundamentals of effective social enterprises, which were derived from research conducted by ISEA in India, Indonesia, Bangladesh and the Philippines. Credit: Ben Kritz/IPS

Fundamentals of social enterprises

On Sunday Sept. 8, Dr. Marie Lisa Dacanay president of the Institute for Social Entrepreneurship in Asia (ISEA) outlined the fundamentals of effective social enterprises, which were derived from research conducted by the institute in India, Indonesia, Bangladesh and the Philippines.

Social enterprises have three common traits, Dacanay explained:

They are driven by a social mission instead of an enterprise mission;

Successful social enterprises are wealth-creating organisations that provide some form of marketable products or services; and

They follow a distributive enterprise philosophy in that profits are directed towards the social mission rather than being collected as return on investment.

In carrying out its mission, a social enterprise faces a number of external and internal challenges, Dacanay said.

External pressures come in the form of climate or environmental factors – a significant concern of agriculture-based enterprises; unfavourable government policies; harmful industry or market practises; inadequate government support for social programs; and institutional corruption.

Internal challenges include difficulty in accessing needed technology; securing initial financing; organisational and management capacity; production efficiency; and developing practical measures of the enterprise’s social impact.

Based on ISEA’s research, successful social enterprises can be organised following an entrepreneur non-profit model, a social cooperative model, a social business model, or what she described as “social entrepreneurship intervention,” which is a hybrid combining characteristics of all three models.
In determining which form of organisation is most suitable to the social mission, Dacanay told IPS, “I think everything starts with the reality. Every social entrepreneur starts with, ‘what are the needs, and the problem?’”

“The first step is really understanding the stakeholders you want to help,” Dacanay continued, “find out what they are doing already, and look at what gaps there are. That, along with the resources and capabilities available, define a way of moving forward, and then the organisational form will follow.”

Social business is still business

In the Saturday workshop, Earl Parreno, the chairman of the Philippines’ Altertrade Foundation, Inc. (ATFI) conducted a training in business planning basics for the assembled people’s organisations.

Defining a social enterprise as one that pursues a triple bottom line philosophy (financial, social, and environmental results), Parreno explained that the fundamentals of business planning must still be applied, but that organisations that are made up of people who are both the providers and beneficiaries of a social mission are often handicapped by a complete lack of capacity.

“Poverty is not just lack of financial resources,” Parreno told the workshop participants in his presentation, “It’s really incapability, a lack of knowledge.”

Developing the capabilities can be an arduous process, but is achievable. One of ATFI’s areas of focus in the Philippines is among poor farmworkers in Negros Province, a centre for sugar production. Parreno described the success of the social enterprise supported by ATFI in marketing Muscovado sugar – semi-raw sugar that was at one time considered “poor man’s sugar,” but is now a premium-priced staple in organic food stores.

“The business ideation is really critical,” Parreno explained to IPS. “We have a saying here in the Philippines: gaya-gaya puta maya, which means something like ‘copycat.’” A common problem among new social enterprises, Parreno said, is a lack of originality in the revenue-generating product or service they wish to pursue.

“What we stress to our social enterprise partners is that they should not conceive a product or service that’s just better, but one that is truly different and has a ‘solidarity market,’” Parreno said, such as the market of “mindful consumers” for organic Muscovado sugar discovered by the Negros sugar farmers. “That solidarity market is so important. It really gives the people’s organisation a fighting chance.”

According to Parreno, developing a sound business plan, from business ideation through resource mapping, feasibility study, and market analysis answers one of the key concerns expressed by many of the forum participants in the post-workshop discussion: The difficulty in securing initial funding to launch a social enterprise.

“The only difference between this kind of (social) business and a conventional business is where the profits go,” Parreno explained. “The discipline and the steps that need to be taken to develop it are very much the same, and if the result is a good business plan, the investors to get it off the ground will follow.”

A poultry and dried fish production project located in Baras, Rizal Province, east of the Philippine capital, employs about 10 people, all residents of a transient house for leprosy patients. It is a good example of a social enterprise that has proved successful.

Ariel Lazarte, a member of Coalition of Leprosy Advocates of the Philippines (CLAP) who runs the social enterprise, told IPS that sales have been good enough that his out-of-pocket expenses have been fully covered by the revenue, as well as providing much-needed funding for the transient house residents.
The social enterprise, part of HD (Hope and Dignity) Philippines, a non-profit managed by Lazarte, makes about 560 dollars a month.

Half of this is ploughed back into the social enterprise and the remainder is used to pay for the living expenses of the patients, including paying for medicines, transport, food, water, and vitamins.
“The only outside funding we had was for [the pen for the chickens],” Lazarte told IPS, noting that the Tikkun Olam Foundation, which supports Hansen’s disease in the country, provided the funding for this.

“The residents of the house who are capable help to tend the chickens, which are layers, and produce the dried fish. We then sell the eggs and fish in the local market.”

Part of the marketing advantage the poultry project has is that the eggs are organic. “We use organic feed for the chickens,” Lazarte said. “No synthetic feed.”

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/business-social-enterprise/feed/0First Global Forum of Leprosy-Affected People’s Organisations Kicks off in Manilahttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/first-global-forum-leprosy-affected-peoples-organisations-kicks-off-manila/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=first-global-forum-leprosy-affected-peoples-organisations-kicks-off-manila
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/first-global-forum-leprosy-affected-peoples-organisations-kicks-off-manila/#respondSat, 07 Sep 2019 13:48:27 +0000Stella Paulhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163138Being part of a platform where leprosy-affected people from all over the world can freely interact, exchange and share opinions, ideas, experiences and strategies was always something Tasfaye Tadesse dreamt of. So this week, Tadesse packed his bags and travelled for 36 hours from his home in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to reach the Philippine capital […]

At the first Global Forum of People’s Organizations on Hansen’s Disease, which begun on Sept. 7 in Manila, Philippines, participants present their ideas on entrepreneurship models to attain sustainability. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

By Stella PaulMANILA, Sep 7 2019 (IPS)

Being part of a platform where leprosy-affected people from all over the world can freely interact, exchange and share opinions, ideas, experiences and strategies was always something Tasfaye Tadesse dreamt of.

So this week, Tadesse packed his bags and travelled for 36 hours from his home in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to reach the Philippine capital of Manila.

The journey was worth it.

Tadasse, the managing director of Ethiopian National Association of Persons Affected by Leprosy, arrived to attend the first-ever global forum for people with Hansen’s disease, commonly known as leprosy. There he found an increasing family.

Participants from 23 countries across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean are meeting from Sept. 7 to 10 at the Global Forum of People’s Organizations on Hansen’s Disease.

Today, Sept. 7, at the first day of the 4-day forum, Tadesse shared some of the activities and developments that had taken place recently in Africa, including providing feedback on a a regional meeting of all people living with leprosy in East and West Africa.

Held in February, the meeting was the first time that leprosy-affected people from across the continent came together as one community with a common goal of dealing with the challenges they face.

“We only knew about each other until then, but never spoke directly. The assembly brought us together and helped us have a conversation. We came up with a number of ideas and recommendations,” Tadesse told IPS.

One of the recommendations was to not use the word leprosy as it still evokes negative reaction.

“People start to judge the moment they hear the word leprosy, without even caring to find out if the person is cured or almost cured. So, this is clear stigmatisation and its very common everywhere,” he said.

Other recommendations included the African regional assembly deciding to form a social media group for smooth and regular communication among the areas impacted by Hansen’s disease across Africa.

“I didn’t know how to use what’s app before. So after I joined, I felt a sense of accomplishment,” he said. The group first included only the five countries that participated in the African regional assembly: Morocco, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Tanzania and Ghana.

Since February, people from organisations in other countries such as Kenya, Mozambique and South Africa have joined. With the network expanding, Tadesse says it is becoming truly pan Africa.

Lilibeth Nwakaego is a Lagos-based lawyer who has been instrumental in creating and growing the What’s app group across Africa.

“Information is power. So, sharing information is not just about good communication, but also about empowerment of [leprosy-affected] people,” said Nwakaego.

“We now have eight African countries in our What’s app network and I am going to make everyone an admin, so that they can all keep adding new members in their respective countries. We need to take information and ideas out of papers and meeting rooms to the people who need that and this is our way to do so,” Nwakaego told IPS.

The forum participants also learnt of recommendations from Asia and Latin America, regions which had also organised similar assemblies earlier this year. Speaking of the event held in Manila in March, Frank Onde, chairperson of Coalition of Leprosy Advocates of the Philippines (CLAP), recalled how the assembly had highlighted the connection between climate change and leprosy.

“Our participants from Kiribati are suffering more because of climate change. There are now more flooding which is adding to the challenges. During flooding, one must evacuate to higher ground but people who have advanced stage of leprosy cannot do this and so they are suffering. It was the first time that we came to hear about such an issue,” Onde said at the forum.

Foustino Pinto, the national coordinator for the Movement for Reintegration of People Affected by Hansen’s Disease (MORHAN) – an organisation of leprosy affected people in Brazil, shared the highlights from the Latin American regional assembly that took place this April.

One of the biggest outcomes of the assembly was a demand to adopt a higher level of respect and make leprosy affected people central to any policy decision.

“Right now, what we see is that our voices are casually heard and our opinions and ideas are not really listened to. There is a lack of seriousness. Take the term leprosy, for example. Who is deciding how this disease should be mentioned? Not the people living with it! So, we feel that there is a lot of room for improvement here. For us, the most important issues are dignity, equality and respect for the human rights of leprosy-affected people,” Pinto told IPS.

Earlier while delivering the key-note address, Dr. Maria Francia Laxamana, the assistant secretary in the Philippines Ministry of Health, said that there was a need to make policies that would truly help leprosy-affected people empower themselves. In the Philippines, the government was considering providing subsidies to all leprosy-affected people. Such a policy would help the leprosy-affected people live a better life as their current economic condition was a big concern.

Takahiro Nanri, executive director of SHF, called out for the free flow of ideas and experience sharing among the participants. This would help lead the future course of action to eliminate leprosy, he said.

The participants will also attend the International Leprosy Congress scheduled to take place in Manila Sept. 11 to 13.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/first-global-forum-leprosy-affected-peoples-organisations-kicks-off-manila/feed/0A Global Forum to Encourage Dialogue and Share Solutionshttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/global-forum-encourage-dialogue-share-solutions/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=global-forum-encourage-dialogue-share-solutions
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/global-forum-encourage-dialogue-share-solutions/#respondFri, 06 Sep 2019 02:20:49 +0000Stella Paulhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163146Professor Takahiro Nanri is the executive director of the Sasakawa Health Foundation, co-organiser of the Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease, which will take place from Sept. 7 to 10 in the Philippines. A 4-day event, the forum will be the first of its kind to bring together grassroot organisations that are of, […]

Professor Takahiro Nanri is the executive director of the Sasakawa Health Foundation, co-organiser of the Global Forum of People’s Organisations on Hansen’s Disease, which will take place from Sept. 7 to 10 in the Philippines.

A 4-day event, the forum will be the first of its kind to bring together grassroot organisations that are of, by and for the people affected by leprosy across the world.

On the eve of the forum, IPS correspondent Stella Paul spoke with Nanri who shared in brief the rationale of the event and some of the expected outcomes.

The forum, he said, is entirely focused on bringing together all the leprosy-affected people’s organisations on one platform and give them an opportunity to share their experiences, especially the positive ones, so that they can inspire others to follow and start new collaborations.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/global-forum-encourage-dialogue-share-solutions/feed/0Is There Discrimination Against Women in Healthcare in India?http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/discrimination-women-healthcare-india/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=discrimination-women-healthcare-india
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/discrimination-women-healthcare-india/#respondThu, 05 Sep 2019 08:14:59 +0000Farhana Haque Rahman and Raghav Gaihahttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163111In an inaugural lecture at the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University, Amartya Sen began with a swipe at Queen Victoria who complained to Sir Theodore Martin in 1870 about & quote: this mad, wicked folly of ‘Woman’s Rights’ “, as in her rarefied world nobody could trample upon her rights. The world has of course […]

In an inaugural lecture at the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University, Amartya Sen began with a swipe at Queen Victoria who complained to Sir Theodore Martin in 1870 about & quote: this mad, wicked folly of ‘Woman’s Rights’ “, as in her rarefied world nobody could trample upon her rights. The world has of course changed dramatically and women’s rights are widely acknowledged but injustices persist. Our concern here is with health injustices that are widely prevalent in India. These take multiple forms: female foeticide, widespread morbidity and denial of access to good quality healthcare until a critical condition develops. Our focus here is on vulnerability of women to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and their limited access to good quality healthcare in India.

Farhana Haque Rahman

NCDs kill 40 million annually, accounting for about 70 % of all deaths globally. NCDs are chronic in nature and take a long time to develop. They are linked to aging and affluence and have replaced infectious diseases and malnutrition as the dominant causes of ill-health and death in much of the world, including India. The major NCDs include cardiovascular diseases, cancer, chronic respiratory diseases and diabetes. These account for 42 % of deaths in India. Some of the risk factors associated with NCDs are aging, unhealthy diet, physical inactivity, smoking, excessive use of alcohol and excess weight.

The burden of NCDs shifted to the older segments of population ( 60 years), highest prevalence being amongst to the oldest men and women ( 80 years+), with higher prevalence among women.

In sharp contrast to women who recorded a significant rise, overall prevalence of NCDs among men fell significantly during 2004-14, based on the National Sample Survey data for India. Men accounted for the majority in 2004, but women did so in 2014. The majority of NCD cases were in the rural areas for both men and women. However, the prevalence among urban women was higher than among urban men in 2014.

There was a significant affluence gradient to prevalence of NCDs among men, with a sharp increase in the prevalence from the lowest expenditure quintile to the highest in 2004. This is similar to what women experienced. A similar pattern is reproduced among both men and women in 2014, but with one reversal. While the prevalence among the most affluent men was higher than among the most affluent women in 2004, the latter recorded a higher prevalence ten years later, in 2014.

Raghav Gaiha

An important issue is whether higher vulnerability of women to NCDs manifests in greater access to good quality healthcare. To assess this, we rely on the India Human Development Survey 2015. To assess the quality of health care, we distinguish between two healthcare providers: public hospitals/doctors and private hospitals/doctors. More respondents rank private healthcare providers higher in quality than public providers. Another proximate indicator of quality is location of healthcare facilities. Quality of treatment received at home and in the same village is often inferior to treatment received in another village/town/district. The point to note is that a village may or may not have a primary healthcare centre but towns and districts are much better equipped with healthcare facilities for specialized treatment of NCDs. So location is another predictor of quality of healthcare.

Public providers were chosen by just under one-third of old women suffering from at least one NCD. In a striking contrast, large majorities –about two-thirds- depended on private providers (excluding traditional faith healers) in 2012. Similar proportions are reproduced for old men. So on this quality criterion, there was little difference between old men and women.

But the distance travelled by women and men reveals a contrast.

Large shares of old women, about 45 %, suffering from at least 1 NCD had their first treatment at home and in the same village. The majority, about 55 %, travelled to another village/town/district. Large shares of men suffering from 1 NCD, about 40 %- were treated at home and in the same village while the majority, about 58 %-travelled to another village/town/district.

From this perspective, the fact that larger shares of women received treatment at home and in the same village than men with a chronic NCD suggests that women had lower access to costlier and more specialized treatment despite their greater vulnerability to NCDs; however, the difference between men and women in their reliance on private providers is not significant.

In brief, while women are more prone to NCDs, their access to costlier and more specialized healthcare is lower than that of men. So the evidence favoring discrimination against women in good quality healthcare is limited but suggestive of a bias.

Social and family norms that restrict women’s access to health care are not as rigid as generally believed. Greater awareness of equity and better recognition of women’s contribution to household and social welfare could enhance their access to health care. Besides, outside employment options for women with some bargaining power (eg, high school education) could reinforce their autonomy.

(Farhana Haque-Rahman, a journalist and communications expert, is a former senior United Nations official and Raghav Gaiha is Visiting Scholar, Population Studies Centre, University of Pennsylvania and (Hon.) Professorial Research Fellow, Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, England).

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/discrimination-women-healthcare-india/feed/0Achieving Global Consensus on How to Slow Down Loss of Landhttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/achieving-global-consensus-to-slow-down-loss-of-land/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=achieving-global-consensus-to-slow-down-loss-of-land
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/achieving-global-consensus-to-slow-down-loss-of-land/#respondWed, 04 Sep 2019 15:58:59 +0000Ranjit Devrajhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163105Expectations are high, perhaps too high, as the 14th Conference of the Parties (CoP 14) of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), now into the third day of its two-week session, is being held outside the smog-filled Indian capital of New Delhi. At the inauguration on Monday, India’s minister for environment, forests and […]

India’s minister for environment, forests and climate change, Prakash Javadekar (left), said he would be happy if CoP 14 could achieve consensus on such difficult issues as drought management and land tenure. Courtesy: Ranjit Devraj

By Ranjit DevrajNEW DELHI, Sep 4 2019 (IPS)

Expectations are high, perhaps too high, as the 14th Conference of the Parties (CoP 14) of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), now into the third day of its two-week session, is being held outside the smog-filled Indian capital of New Delhi.

At the inauguration on Monday, India’s minister for environment, forests and climate change, Prakash Javadekar, soon after ceremonies to mark his taking over as president of the Convention for the next two years, said he would be happy if CoP 14 could achieve consensus on such difficult issues as drought management and land tenure.

Other issues on the agenda of CoP14, themed ‘Restore land, Sustain future’ and located in Greater Noida, in northern Uttar Pradesh state, include negotiations over consumption and production flows that have a bearing on agriculture and urbanisation, restoration of ecosystems and dealing with climate change.

The IPCC report covered interlinked, overlapping issues that are at the core of CoP14 deliberations — climate, change, desertification, and degradation, sustainable land management, food security and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems.

“Sustainable land management can contribute to reducing the negative impacts of multiple stressors, including climate change, on ecosystems and societies,” the IPCC report said. It also identified land use change as the largest driver of biodiversity loss and as having the greatest impact on the environment.

Javadekar said he saw hope in the fact that of the 196 parties to the Convention 122, including some of the most populous like Brazil, China, India, Nigeria, Russia and South Africa have agreed to make the U.N. Sustainable Development Goal of achieving land degradation neutrality (LDN) targets by 2030 as national objectives.

But the difficulty of seeing results on the ground can be gauged from India’s own difficult situation. Nearly 30 percent of India’s 328 million hectares, supporting 1.3 billion people, has become degraded through deforestation, over-cultivation, soil-erosion and wetland depletion, according to a satellite survey conducted in 2016 by the Indian Space Research Organisation.

A study, conducted last year by The Energy and Resource Institute (TERI), an independent think-tank based in New Delhi, estimates India’s losses from land degradation and change in land use to be worth 47 billion dollars in 2014—2015.

The question before CoP14 is how participating countries can slow down loss of land and along with it biodiversity threatening to impact 3.2 billion people across the world. “Three out of every four hectares have been altered from their natural states and the productivity of one every four hectares of land has been declining,” according to UNCCD.

Running in parallel to CoP14 is the 14th session of UNCCD’s committee on science and technology (CST14), a subsidiary body with stated objectives — estimating soil organic carbon lost as a result of land degradation, addressing the ‘land-drought nexus’ through land-based interventions and translating available science into policy options for participating countries.

On Tuesday, as CoP4 launched into substantive business, the participants at the CST and other subsidiary bodies began to voice real apprehensions and demands.

Bhutan representing the Asia Pacific group, highlighted the need for cooperation at all levels to disseminate and translate identified technologies and knowledge into direct benefits for local land users.

Bangladesh pointed out that LDN targets are sometimes linked to transboundary water resources and also called for mobilising additional resources for capacity building.

Colombia, speaking for the Latin America and Caribbean group, appreciated the value of research by the scientific panels, but urged introduction of improved technologies and mitigation strategies to reduce the direct impacts of drought on ecosystems, starting with soil degradation.

Russia, on behalf of Central and Eastern Europe, mooted the establishment of technical centres in the region to support the generation of scientific evidence to prevent and manage droughts, sustainable use of forests and peatlands and monitoring of sand and dust storms.

Civil society organisations, led by the Cape Town-based Environmental Monitoring Group, were also critical of the UNCCD for putting too much emphasis on LDN and demanded optimisation of land use through practical solutions that would ensure that carbon is retained in the soil.

“Retaining carbon in the soil is of particular value to India and its neighbouring countries, which presently have the world’s greatest rainwater runoffs into the sea,” says Himanshu Thakkar, coordinator, South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People (SANDRP), a New Delhi based NGO, working on the water and environment sectors.

“What South Asian countries need to do urgently is to improve the rainwater harvesting so as to recharge groundwater aquifers and local water bodies in a given catchment so that water is available in the post-monsoon period that increasingly see severe droughts,” Thakkar tells IPS. “This is where governments can be supportive.”

Benefits such as preventing soil degradation and consequent landslides that have become a common feature in South India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

A study published in May said half of the area around 16 of India’s 24 major river basins is facing droughts due to lowered soil moisture levels while at least a third of its 18 river basins has become non-resilient to vegetation droughts.

Responding to the suggestions and demands the Secretariat highlighted recommendations to ensure mainstreaming of LDN targets in national strategies and action programmes, partnerships on science-policy to increase awareness and understanding of LDN and collaborations to assess finance and capacity development needs.

In all, the delegates, who include 90 ministers and more than 7,000 participants drawn from among government officials, civil society and the scientific community from the 197 parties will thrash out 30 decision texts and draw up action plans to strengthen land-use policies and address emerging threats such as droughts, forest fires, dust storms and forced migration.

“The agenda shows that governments have come to CoP14 ready to find solutions to many difficult, knotty and emerging policy issues,” said Thiaw at the inaugural session. The conference ends with the parties signing a ‘New Delhi Declaration’ outlining actions to meet UNCCD goals for 2018-2030.

On the road to sustainable development, Sri Lanka provides an interesting case study. Having overcome a three-decade domestic conflict, Sri Lanka has begun its transformation towards a sustainable and resilient society. The extreme poverty rate ($1.90 a day) dropped to 0.8 per cent in 2016. The unemployment rate is below 5 per cent since 2010.

Free education and health policies have resulted in high youth literacy rates (98.7 per cent) and high life expectancy (75 years). Measured by its index of human development, Sri Lanka is a high achiever.

However, Sri Lanka still faces major challenges. Improving the quality and relevance of education, providing medical treatment and care facilities for the ageing population, and fighting climate disasters call for further policy support, financial mobilization and partnership strengthening.

Government initiatives to mainstream Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Sri Lanka has been incorporating the SDGs into its national policy framework. Since the endorsement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, Sri Lanka has taken several momentous initiatives.

The most important one is the Sustainable Development Act in 2017, which establishes the legal framework to implement the SDGs with improved institutional and policy coherence. Under this Act, the Sustainable Development Council has been established, which formulates related national policies and guides new development projects.

From increasing investment to raising investment efficiency

Investments needed to achieve the SDGs are huge, but not beyond reach. Preliminary estimates by ESCAP suggest that Sri Lanka needs an annual additional investment of 4.4 per cent of the 2018 GDP through 2030 to provide a social protection floor (1.7 per cent), poverty gap transfers (0.2 per cent), quality education (1.6 per cent) and climate-resilient infrastructure (0.8 per cent).

Some of these investment needs have been mainstreamed into the Sri Lankan Government’s budgets. For example, the Budget 2019 focuses on:

• Quality education

by reforming curricula to enable the combination of Science, Technology, Engineering, Math and the Arts (STEM + A), enhancing continuous professional training for teachers, and introducing more technology in education delivery;

• Healthcare

services and facilities by enhancing investments in healthcare delivery, quality and infrastructure;

The country’s access to concessionary finance (e.g. ODA) has declined given its elevation to middle-income status. Its export earnings and foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows have remained below potential.

Various measures have been taken to attract FDI and boost export earnings including implementation of a new National Export Strategy and easing business environment by digitalizing company registration and land registry.

In addition to these measures, improving investment efficiency is critical. ESCAP estimates that the developing Asia-Pacific countries can achieve similar levels of outputs and outcomes in health and education sectors using 30 per cent fewer resources. Among its peer countries, Sri Lanka performs well in health and education sectors; however, its investment efficiency in infrastructure could be improved.

To enhance infrastructure investment efficiency for the public sector, public financial management institutions – notably project appraisal, selection and management – need to be strengthened.

Effective coordination among different government branches for construction permits, environmental clearance and land acquisition is important, as these processes often lead to project delays.

Ensuring a steady flow of resources for operations and maintenance is a necessary condition for success. Good maintenance generates substantial savings, reducing the total lifecycle costs of infrastructure projects.

Multi-stakeholder partnerships

Raising awareness among relevant stakeholders and building capacity of relevant institutions are necessary to achieve the SDGs. Developing multi-stakeholder partnerships provide much room for improvement in Sri Lanka to fully engage the general public and the private sector. An effective mechanism is needed for collaborative engagement in SDG implementation, from policy formulation to monitoring.

Furthermore, regional cooperation is an area with great potential that has not yet fully entered the SDG discourse in Sri Lanka. Regional cooperation in South Asia and the broader Indian Ocean economy can help Sri Lanka accelerate its SDG progress in several areas, including climate change, renewable energy transition and food security.

The 2030 Agenda provides a blueprint to achieve a more sustainable future for all. Sri Lanka’s efforts in mainstreaming the SDGs into its national planning and budgeting are an interesting case for the rest of the Asia-Pacific region to learn – a country does not need to wait until it achieves economic affluence before tackling social well-being and environmental health. Developing countries should incorporate social and environmental goals into their path towards prosperity.

We have the potential to lead the world in animal welfare, but the tendency to look at the issue in a vacuum has prevented this movement from being taken seriously.

Since early civilisation, animals have been an integral part of human experience. We have domesticated them for both agriculture and companionship. However, over time our kinship with them has morphed into abuse in which the welfare of animals is highly compromised. Now we see animals purely for their utility; in fact, a perception has been created that humans always have precedence over animals. It has now become common practice to inflict cruelty upon them.

Animal welfare has always been seen as a niche subject, often relegated to being an emotional one. It has also been perceived as a street dog issue or service for pet or privately-‘owned’ animals, mainly dogs and cats. Of course, protection of cows has often grabbed headlines as well, but never for their welfare, and the issue is often politically motivated.

In comparison to other animal welfare issues (those that extend beyond what we have highlighted above), people’s awareness tends to be limited to issues pertaining to wildlife exploitation; in particular, tiger conservation and human-wildlife conflict (for example, with leopards and snakes). But animals are abused across the country and world, whether in laboratories, farms, or pet shops; and the abuse is often justified for human good.

One such example is the elephant

India has prohibited ivory trade since 1972, when the Wildlife Protection Act came in; however there are still concerns about the illegal trade and the animals’ treatment in captivity. Their exploitation is masked by activities they are forced into, such as leisurely rides; being chained in temples to give blessings; and being hired out for festivals, weddings, and celebrations, where they are often tormented amongst noisy, frenzied crowds.

Once the spirit is broken, the animal is subjected to poor working conditions. And in the absence of its natural environment, it begins to behave differently, swaying its head from side to side—a sight we have all seen too often. These conditions often result in stress, leading to instances of violence and human-animal conflicts. Elephants we see on television losing control are representative of the direct result of years of confinement and abuse.

In India, elephants are epitomised as symbols of a very popular Hindu god, and yet their treatment has been just the opposite.

These shy creatures are valuable to both people and the ecosystem. They protect crops because they are natural pest controllers, and reduce the need for toxic insecticides. Their sharp claws, long snouts, and tongues help aerate the soil, and more so, each pangolin can eat millions of insects each year.

Their meat and scales are usually exported to China for making traditional Chinese medicines, cosmetics, and jewellery.

Pangolins—ant-eaters who are targeted mainly for their meat and scales—are the most trafficked mammal in the world | Photo courtesy: AJT Johnsingh, WWF-India and NCF, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

And this is just the tip of the iceberg

The suffering that sinks the titanic, is of those animals that are raised for food. This is an issue that is so neglected that even most of the animal protection community turns a blind eye.

Animal agriculture, which was once predominately carried out by smallholder farmers and considered a symbiotic relationship, has now been highly industrialised where the single point of focus is to increase productivity per animal. In our desire to do this, we have trait selected chickens to grow so freakishly fast that their own skeletons cannot hold their body weight. These abnormally large animals are then used for meat.

More than 80 percent of India’s eggs come from egg-laying hens confined in small cages, termed ‘battery cages’, where they cannot stand up straight, turn around, or spread their wings. The space given to each is reportedly less than an A4 size sheet of paper.

Factory farms don’t inflict harm just on animals; there are environmental impacts as well. The volume of waste that is allowed to accumulate in factory farms presents an enviornmental hazard. Water quality issues also arise from factory farm-generated waste, which include contamination of surface water and ground water. In addition, the microbial breakdown of organic carbon and nitrogen compounds in the animal manure can contribute to air pollution and odour problems. Emission of noxious levels of gases puts workers and nearby residents at risk of developing several acute and chronic illnesses.

What has India done to address some of this?

All is not grim. India has historically enacted good laws; for instance, the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act enacted in 1960 by the Parliament of India, prevents the infliction of unnecessary pain or suffering on animals. This act has been utilised to appeal to the government against nefarious acts committed towards animals. India also enjoys one of the strictest wildlife protection laws. While some countries are now waking up to regulating trade in wildlife—a case in point being ivory trade—India leads the prohibition on ivory trade, including that of the extinct mammoth to prevent any proliferation of the trade.

Some of the biggest triumphs for animal welfare in India in the last decade, saw the ban of dolphinariums (aquariums for dolphins) in 2013, by the Ministry of Environment and Forests. In addition, the Government of India banned animal testing for cosmetics in 2014, followed by a prohibition on the import of cosmetics tested on animals, placing India on the map for scientifically progressive countries.

While these are positive developments, regulators and the government constitute just one slice of the pie. What we need today is widespread acceptance of animal protection as a serious social issue. Animal and non-animal social sectors must recognise their intersectionality and work together. Corporates need to look at what role their institutions are playing in animal cruelty, be it procuring battery caged eggs or team outings at captive animal spaces.

Mahatma Gandhi once said, “The greatness of a nation and its progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated”. India has the potential to lead the world in animal welfare, however the tendency to look at animal welfare issues in a vacuum rather than as an interlinked issue with other civil society concerns, has prevented this movement from being taken seriously.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/09/animal-welfare-india-stand/feed/0Disaster Risk Resilience: Key to Protecting Vulnerable Communitieshttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/disaster-risk-resilience-key-protecting-vulnerable-communities/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=disaster-risk-resilience-key-protecting-vulnerable-communities
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/disaster-risk-resilience-key-protecting-vulnerable-communities/#respondWed, 28 Aug 2019 07:23:40 +0000Armida Salsiah Alisjahbanahttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=163020Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana is Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).

Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana is Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).

By Armida Salsiah AlisjahbanaBANGKOK, Thailand, Aug 28 2019 (IPS)

The past five years have been the hottest on record in Asia and the Pacific. Unprecedented heatwaves have swept across our region, cascading into slow onset disasters such as drought. Yet heat is only part of the picture. Tropical cyclones have struck new, unprepared parts of our region and devastatingly frequent floods have ensued. In Iran, these affected 10 million people this year and displaced 500,000 of which half were children. Bangladesh is experiencing its fourth wave of flooding in 2019. Last year, the state of Kerala in India faced the worst floods in a century.

Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana

This is the new climate reality in Asia and the Pacific. The scale of forecast economic losses for the region is sobering. Including slow-onset disasters, average annualised losses until 2030 are set to quadruple to about $675 billion compared to previous estimates. This represents 2.4 percent of the region’s GDP. Economic losses of such magnitude will undermine both economic growth and our region’s efforts to reduce poverty and inequality, keeping children out of schools and adults of work. Basic health services will be undermined, crops destroyed and food security jeopardised. If we do not act now, Asia-Pacific’s poorest communities will be among the worst affected.

Four areas of Asia and the Pacific are particularly impacted, hotspots which combine vulnerability to climate change, poverty and disaster risk. In transboundary river basins in South and South-East Asia such as the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna river basin, floods alternate with prolonged droughts. In South-East Asia and East and North-East Asia earthquakes, tsunamis and landslides threaten poor populations in the Pacific Ring of Fire. Intensifying sand and dust storms are blighting East, Central and South-west Asia. Vulnerable populations in Pacific Small Islands Developing States are five times more at risk of disasters than a person in South and South-East Asia. Many countries’ sustainable development prospects are now directly dependent on their exposure to natural disasters and their ability to build resilience.

Yet this vicious cycle between poverty, inequalities and disasters is not inevitable. It can be broken if an integrated approach is taken to investing in social and disaster resilience policies. As disasters disproportionately affect the poor, building resilience must include investment in social protection as the most effective means of reducing poverty. Conditional cash transfer systems can be particularly effective as was shown in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines. Increasing pre-arranged risk finance and climate risk insurance is also crucial. While investments needed are significant, in most countries these are equivalent to less than half the costs forecast to result from natural disasters.

The use of technological innovations to protect the region from natural disasters must go hand in hand with these investments. Big data reveal patterns and associations between complex disaster risks and predict extreme weather and slow onset disasters to improve the readiness of our economies and our societies. In countries affected by typhoons, big data applications can make early warning systems stronger and can contribute to saving lives and reducing damage. China and India are leading the way in using technology to warn people of impending disasters, make their infrastructure more resilient and deliver targeted assistance to affected farmers and citizens.

Asia and the Pacific can learn from this best practice and multilateral cooperation is the way to give scale to our region’s disaster resilience effort. With this ambition in mind, representatives from countries across the region are meeting in Bangkok this week at the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) to explore regional responses to natural disasters. Their focus will include strengthening Asia-Pacific’s Disaster Resilience Network and capitalising on innovative technology applications for the benefit of the broader region. This is our opportunity to replicate successes, accelerate drought mitigation strategies and develop a regional sand and dust storm alert system. I hope the region can seize it to protect vulnerable communities from disaster risk in every corner of Asia and the Pacific.

Malaysia lays claim to the world’s lowest national poverty rate by using an unduly low poverty line that does not reflect the cost of living and by excluding vulnerable populations from its official figures.

While Malaysia has achieved undeniably impressive growth in reducing poverty in the last 50 years, the official claim that poverty has been eradicated, or exists merely in small pockets in rural areas, is incorrect and has crippled policymaking.

Malaysia’s official poverty rate dropped from 49 per cent in 1970 to just 0.4 per cent in 2016. However, the national poverty line of RM 980 (US$235) per household per month would see an urban family of four surviving on RM 8, or less than US$2, per person per day.

This is a tragically low line for a country on the cusp of attaining high income status, especially since a range of rigorous independent analyses have suggested a more realistic poverty rate of 16-20 per cent, and about nine per cent of households survive on less than RM 2,000 (US$479) per month.

Actual poverty rates are much higher than official figures suggest, and the Government needs to reassess how it measures poverty so that the hardship many Malaysians experience is not conjured out of existence by a statistical sleight of hand.

Malaysia’s new Government should urgently reconsider its approach if the country is to make any real progress on this issue.

Despite near-universal healthcare and high school enrolment rates for citizens, and a growing economy, large parts of the population are being left behind and many people living above the official poverty line are in fact in poverty.

I spoke with families who have struggled to pay their rent, whose children could not afford to go to school, and who went without healthcare because of the cost of transportation.

Undercounting has also led to underinvestment in poverty reduction and an inadequate social safety net that does not meet people’s needs. A fragmented social protection system is putting many people’s rights to food, housing, and education at risk.

Poor people in Malaysia suffered disproportionate violations of their civil and political rights, including in prisons and in the legal system.

The Special Rapporteur visits an indigenous community in Sarawak. Credit: Bassam Khawaja 2019

Indigenous peoples suffer much higher rates of poverty, and despite laudable commitments by the Government to ensure their rights, the customary land of indigenous communities remains under siege, jeopardising their livelihoods, food security, and access to traditional medicines.

I was troubled to hear state officials speak of the need for indigenous communities to ‘adapt’ and relocate to urban areas in order to secure their rights.

Millions of non-citizens including migrants, refugees and stateless people are barred from the public school system, face severe barriers to accessing healthcare, and are often unable to work legally, yet are systematically excluded from official poverty statistics.

Migrant workers, who are ubiquitous in the Malaysian labour force, are driven into poverty and set up for exploitation by a combination of unscrupulous recruitment agents and employers, harsh immigration policy, lax enforcement of labour protections, and the risk of deportation for pursuing their rights.

The Government should urgently revise the way it measures poverty to bring it into line with the country’s cost of living, and it should include vulnerable non-citizen groups in the new measure. It should also stop arbitrarily withholding information that is crucial to understanding poverty and inequality, such as household survey microdata.

The Malaysians I met who were struggling to get by or to provide support to those in need deserve better than to be told by policymakers that poverty does not exist, in direct contradiction of their own experiences.

Malaysia has made real progress on a range of progressive commitments, but the new Government should not deny the existence of the poor and marginalised. Instead, it should step up efforts to fulfil their rights.”

*The Special Rapporteur will present a comprehensive report with his conclusions and recommendations to the Human Rights Council in Geneva in June 2020. He travelled to Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, Sarawak, Sabah, and Kelantan during his visit to Malaysia, and met state and federal Government officials, international agencies, civil society, academics, and people affected by poverty in urban and rural areas. He visited a soup kitchen, a women’s shelter, a children’s crisis centre, low-cost housing flats, a disability centre, indigenous communities, and informal settlements and schools.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/malaysia-vastly-undercounting-poverty/feed/0After Two Years of Horrors in Burma, the U.S. Is Still Doing Too Little, Too Latehttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/two-years-horrors-burma-u-s-still-little-late/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=two-years-horrors-burma-u-s-still-little-late
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/two-years-horrors-burma-u-s-still-little-late/#respondMon, 26 Aug 2019 12:55:05 +0000Nadine Maenza and Anurima Bhargavahttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=162987Nadine Maenza is vice chair at the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) and the founding Executive Director of Patriot Voices.Anurima Bhargava is a USCIRF commissioner, a civil rights lawyer who served in the Justice Department under the Obama Administration, and the president of Anthem of Us.

Monsoon season is currently wreaking havoc on the more than 911,000 Rohingya refugees displaced from their homeland in Burma (Myanmar) to the ramshackle camps of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.

Two years ago, in August 2017, a brutal military crackdown pushed more than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims and other ethnic and religious minorities from Burma’s Rakhine State to flee for safety. The Burmese military has shamefully denied and tried to hide its barbarism, which includes arbitrary detention, enforced disappearances, displacement, rape, torture and arbitrary killings.

And, Burma’s government has repudiated the international community’s attempts to document the crimes committed under international law, all while denying Rohingya basic rights like freedom of movement, access to health care and basic necessities, and citizenship.

Shockingly, those responsible for these heinous crimes—either by the explicit actions of Burma’s military or the complicit indifference of Burma’s government—have thus far faced no serious consequences. Where is the U.S. government’s admonition and strong policy response?

First, it is imperative that the U.S. government decide whether the atrocities committed against Rohingya Muslims, Christians and others in Burma constitute more than ethnic cleansing.

When the U.S. Department of State last year issued its report documenting atrocities in northern Rakhine State, it created an expectation that a more serious determination—either crimes against humanity or genocide—would be forthcoming.

The label “ethnic cleansing” unequivocally fails to capture the full extent of crimes that religious and ethnic communities in Burma have suffered at the hands of the military.

Second, the U.S. government must sanction Burmese military officials and the companies under the military’s control so that those who perpetrated these atrocities are held accountable for their crimes. The U.S. Department of the Treasury has imposed economic sanctions on five military officials and two military units under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, and the State Department placed travel bans on four other senior military leaders, including the commander-in-chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing.

But banning the ability to travel to the United States is paltry compared to the monstrous acts the military has undertaken against religious and ethnic minorities. Targeted tools like economic sanctions must also be imposed on military officials and other responsible parties.

Thanks to a recent report issued by the United Nations’ Independent International Fact-Finding Mission, the international community now has a comprehensive list of the military’s businesses to consider for sanctions.

The entities on the list—including two major holding companies: Myanmar Economic Holdings Limited (MEHL) and Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC)—are owned or influenced by Burma’s military and use the ill-gotten gains from their business ventures to commit human rights violations.

There may be legitimate concerns about the impact that sanctions or other bans will have on Burma’s economy and the overall bilateral relationship; for example, some fear that sanctions will push Burma into China’s arms.

These two countries are fair-weather friends: chummy when it’s advantageous and oppositional when it’s not. Sanctions by the United States and others will not change this calculus.

Tragically, Rohingya Muslims are not the only victims. Burma’s military and security forces have used the same playbook of ruthless tactics in Rakhine State as they have been using for decades against ethnic minorities—many of whom are Christians—in Kachin and northern Shan states and elsewhere. For two decades, USCIRF has tracked, monitored and raised these abuses with the U.S. government.

For these and other systematic, ongoing and egregious violations of religious freedom, we call on the State Department to re-designate Burma as a “country of particular concern” (CPC) pursuant to the International Religious Freedom Act.

This designation acknowledges that Burma is not living up to its commitments under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that protects the fundamental right to thought, conscience and religion.

Accountability is paramount, and the U.S. government must lead the way with a strong and substantive response. Yet for Rohingya Muslims and other religious and ethnic minorities, their future also is about justice and the ability to safely and voluntarily return home with dignity.

Rohingya Muslims need to know that they can return—either from refugee camps in Bangladesh or from the internally displaced persons camps in Rakhine State—to their homelands.

Plans by the governments of Bangladesh and Burma to repatriate Rohingya refugees should not move forward until conditions are independently verified as safe and Rohingya are consulted about their return, neither of which has happened. Other religious and ethnic minorities that face ongoing threats from the military and ethnic armed organizations require similar safe returns.

But first, the impunity and cycle of violence in Burma must end, and that starts when the U.S. government—including both the Administration and the U.S. Congress—steps up and leads the way for the international community to take a stand against such horrific human rights abuses.

* This opinion piece was written by the two authors who recently traveled to Burma and spoke with Rohingya Muslims and others.

Nadine Maenza is vice chair at the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) and the founding Executive Director of Patriot Voices.Anurima Bhargava is a USCIRF commissioner, a civil rights lawyer who served in the Justice Department under the Obama Administration, and the president of Anthem of Us.

]]>http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/two-years-horrors-burma-u-s-still-little-late/feed/0Hong Kong Protests: A Peaceful and Violent Weekendhttp://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/hong-kong-protests-peaceful-violent-weekend/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=hong-kong-protests-peaceful-violent-weekend
http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/08/hong-kong-protests-peaceful-violent-weekend/#respondSat, 24 Aug 2019 18:28:01 +0000Laurel Chorhttp://www.ipsnews.net/?p=162973As protests in Hong Kong continue over the weekend, thousands of people joined hands to form a human chain that stretched across the city on Friday. It was yet another demonstration – this one entirely peaceful – in a series of protests that have rocked the former British colony for the past 12 weeks. The […]

While standing to form the Hong Kong Way on Aug. 23, Protesters cover their right eye in reference to a woman who received a serious injury to her face, which was allegedly caused by police shooting a rubber bullet at her head. One woman (R) holds a sign urging the U.S. government to pass the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, which was introduced by Representative Chris Smith (R-NJ.) and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL). Credit: Laurel Chor/IPS

By Laurel ChorHONG KONG, Aug 24 2019 (IPS)

As protests in Hong Kong continue over the weekend, thousands of people joined hands to form a human chain that stretched across the city on Friday. It was yet another demonstration – this one entirely peaceful – in a series of protests that have rocked the former British colony for the past 12 weeks.

The “Hong Kong Way” protest was inspired by the 30th anniversary of the Baltic Way, a 600-km human chain formed across Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, which at the time were a part of the Soviet Union. Two million people stood hand-in-hand that day to protest Soviet rule.

Yesterday on Aug. 23, organisers estimated that 135,000 people participated in the Hong Kong version, which stretched 60 kilometres across both Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. Hundreds even made their way up the iconic Lion Rock Mountain, lighting up the peak with cell phone lights.

The human chain marked a shift in tone in the protests, which were often violent. Today, on Aug. 24 protestors reportedly hurled objects and gasoline bombs at police, with police firing tear gas in response.

The Hong Kong protests were sparked by a proposed extradition bill that would allow suspects to be sent to China and possibly face an unjust trial system, making people fearful that Beijing would exploit the law for political reasons. The demonstrations have been further fuelled by anger towards the police for its excessive use of force and protesters’ key demands now include complete withdrawal of the proposed extradition bill, as well as genuine universal suffrage.

Earlier this month, two mainland Chinese men were held and beaten at the Hong Kong airport, where protests had disrupted flights for two days in a row. After the incidents, Beijing strongly condemned the protesters and compared the attacks to “terrorism”. On the other hand, organisations including Amnesty International and the United Nations have repeatedly criticised the Hong Kong Police Force for its violent methods to control the protests.

Mindful of public opinion, protesters took a decidedly more peaceful direction after those incidents. First, they apologised for the airport protests. Then, a peaceful march was organised last weekend, with an estimated 1.7 million attending, echoing two similar marches in June that had attracted one million, then two million a week later – an impressive feat in a city of only 7.4 million residents.

Organisers of the Hong Kong Way issued a statement highlighting Hong Kong protesters’ solidarity: “We are no longer divided into ‘peaceful’ or ‘frontline’ protesters – we are joined as one in our resolve to fight for our freedom.”

Protests were scheduled for the weekend and are set to continue for the rest of the month. The Hong Kong government has yet to meet with protesters and has not caved in on any of their demands, leading the city to wonder how its biggest political crisis will ever be resolved.

The Hong Kong protests were sparked by a proposed extradition bill that would allow suspects to be sent to China and possibly face an unjust trial system, making people fearful that Beijing would exploit the law for political reasons. This dated photo is from a protest rally last month. Courtesy: Studio Incendo/CC By 2.0

Standing in front of the famous Victoria Harbor on Aug. 23, protesters cover their right eye in reference to a woman who received a serious injury to her face, which was allegedly caused by police shooting a rubber bullet at her head, as they hold their cell phone lights in the other hand. Credit: Laurel Chor/IPS

A protester hugs a stranger standing in Sham Shui Po on Aug. 23 as part of the Hong Kong Way, the participants of which included families with children. Credit: Laurel Chor/IPS

Protesters stand in front of the Hong Kong Space Museum as part of the Hong Kong Way, a 60-kilometre human chain on Aug. 23. Credit: Laurel Chor/IPS

Protesters – often not knowing those standing next to them – link up to form the Hong Kong Way in Sham Shui Po on Aug. 23, while chanting slogans encouraging Hong Kong protesters and demanding the “liberation” of the city. Credit: Laurel Chor/IPS

Protesters forming the Hong Kong Way hold up their cell phone lights while standing on a busy road in Sham Shui Po, where double decker buses often passed through, on Aug. 23. Credit: Laurel Chor/IPS